


until we meet again

by jjjat3am



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Backstory, Curtain Fic, Gabe and Trip bonding shenanigans, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-01
Updated: 2014-08-01
Packaged: 2018-02-11 08:05:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2060433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jjjat3am/pseuds/jjjat3am
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Antoine Triplett spends his afternoons at his grandpa's house, learning life skills and chasing stories.</p><p>Meanwhile, Gabe Jones is surviving in a world after the war and trying to teach his grandson to curse in as many different languages as he can.</p><p>(and manages to teach him other things too)</p>
            </blockquote>





	until we meet again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ralkana](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ralkana/gifts).



> written for [ralkana](http://ralkana.tumblr.com/)
> 
> I took your plot bunny and ran with it, I'm afraid. I'm sorry I couldn't give you more Phil Coulson, but I did my best. I'm afraid there is character death in this, but I'm hoping that it's written respectfully enough in the spirit of the story that you won't be upset by it. And of course, I hope you enjoy it.
> 
> There's a fanmix to this story that can be found [here](http://8tracks.com/jjjanimefan/until-we-meet-again), if the link at the start doesn't work.

 

***

 

Every weekday, at 3.45 PM on the dot, Antoine would say goodbye to his friends and walk from the red brick building of his primary school to his grandpa Gabe’s house for lunch.

 

He walked through the new neighborhood, with barely grown oak trees by the side of the road and spotless concrete pavement. There was a tunnel going under the railway tracks that he passed through, tracing a finger over the brightly colored graffiti. There was a new artwork every week, at testament to the city council’s war on what they deemed as vandalism, but instead had the opposite effect on the creativity of the tenacious artist. Every Friday, Antoine would pass by a blank white wall, smelling of fresh paint and anger. Every Monday, there was a brightly colored sketch in its place, singing victory with its awkward lines.

 

Antoine had to cross the road only once on his path and he checked both sides of the road twice before passing, like his grandpa always asked him to.

 

“There are all sorts of nuts out there, kiddo. You got to keep yourself safe.”

 

And Antoine did what his grandpa told him to, at least most of the time.

 

There was a house on the corner of grandpa’s street that had a cat. A huge fluffy Persian, that liked to nap on the windowsill in the afternoon sun and would press its huge body against the glass when it noticed Antoine passing. Sometimes, he rested his fingers on the glass and imagined its purring, but he tried not to do that too often, because Mrs. David, who owned the cat and the house, didn't really like kids very much.

 

Antoine turned right at the house with the cat and hurried toward the well-kept little house at the end of the road where his grandpa Gabe was waiting for him on the porch, smoking a rolled-up cigarette.

 

Grandpa Gabe was a big man, with a booming laugh and gentle calloused palms, and he was Antoine’s favorite person in the whole world. 

 

“Morning kiddo!” he’d say and crouch down, so Antoine could throw his arms around his neck in a hug.

 

“Silly grandpa, it’s not morning anymore! It’s lunch time!” Antoine would answer every time, giggling when his grandpa’s scratchy beard tickled the side of his face.

 

“Oh no, it’s lunch time already? Silly grandpa, he forgot all about the time! Let’s see what the pantry fairies have got for us today!”

 

Grandpa would then carefully take away Antoine’s Captain America themed backpack, before Antoine took off through the open door,  his grandpa hollering behind him to wash his hands before eating.

 

His grandpa never forgot about lunch, of course, and when Antoine hopped onto one of the tall chairs in the kitchen, the table was full of food. Grandpa was a great cook, taught by ‘army rations and a hungry battalion’ or so he always said. The spread always included two kinds of meat (an unimagined luxury in the war and the years after, but one now readily available), a few kinds of potatoes, bread and a lot of vegetables.

 

Then, they would eat, Antoine chattering away about his day and his grandpa making noises in all the right places. They would clear the table together and wash the dishes, grandpa up to his elbows in soap suds and Antoine with a cloth to carefully dry and stack the dishes.

 

After lunch, they would relax for an hour and play games, like chess, or Go fish, or Old Maid. Antoine’s favorite was poker, played for tiny wrapped up candies in a multitude of colors. He had to promise his grandpa not to tell his mother, though.

 

Sometimes, they would tell stories to each other, Antoine in wide-eyed wonder at old war stories of dangerous Nazis, creative use of explosives and Captain America saving the day, and in turn grandpa would listen, with patience and amusement, to Antoine’s stories of race cars, cupcakes and Captain America saving the day.

 

Then, they settled in grandpa’s study, behind a big old desk and Antoine would do his homework, while his grandpa worked on a poem he was trying to translate from Mandarin or Portuguese or Swedish.

 

“Languages are tricky.” He’d tell Antoine, who listened avidly, grateful for a respite from his Math homework. “Sometimes there are words that you can never translate, no matter how hard you try. You can’t capture the spirit of them.”

 

“Oh.” Antoine frowned in thought “Like when you’re feeling something, but you can’t describe what you’re feeling, unless someone else is feeling it too?”

 

His grandpa gave him a surprised look, but nodded.

 

“Just like that.” He reached out to ruffle Antoine’s hair. “Turning into right the little philosopher, aren't you, squirt?”

 

Antoine ducked back to his notebook to hide his pleased grin. They worked like this till sundown and then watched the evening news. Most times, they didn't even get that far before Antoine’s mother was knocking on the front door, looking harried, but happy to see them. Sometimes, she’d let Gabe give her leftovers from lunch, but usually she grabbed Antoine’s hand, kissed her father on the cheek and drove them home.

 

Antoine would turn around in the backseat, watching his grandpa light up a cigarette on the front porch, the small round circle of light like a beacon in the dark.

 

*

 

In July, Antoine would spend a few days at his grandpa’s, at what his mother called a sleepover, but Antoine insistently called a holiday.

 

He got to spend the whole day with his grandpa. They started the day with a breakfast of bread dipped into coffee made from coffee substitute. Grandpa said it was something he learned to drink in the war, where coffee was hard to come by and hoarded like gold. Antoine let the sweet bread dissolve on his tongue, listening to his grandpa sing along to the radio and thought about a dragon crouching over his mother’s Nestea coffee canister. It made him laugh hard enough that grandpa had to pat him on the back a few times to stop his cough.

 

In the mornings, they took a woven basket and went to the shops. Grandpa greeted everyone they met with a tip of his wide-brimmed hat and a cheerful hello. Some answered, offering big grins or shy smiles, but some ducked away, pretending they hadn't heard. Antoine turned his head to watch them go, almost running with quick steps, as if there was somewhere they had to urgently be.

 

The grocery store down the block was tiny, but well stocked, run by a woman named Marie. Every day, she wore a different colored veil and Antoine admired the bright colors and patterns, while she stacked their groceries, chatting to his grandpa in cheerful Urdu. Catching his eye, she’d always smile at him, reaching under the counter to pull out a brightly wrapped candy. ‘A sweet boy’, she’d call him and his grandpa would agree, beaming with pride.

 

Lunch was a lavish affair with the two of them and it involved a lot of singing and dancing along to the gramophone, and getting flour into the strangest places. Antoine learned to cook standing on a step next to his grandpa and watching his hands add spices to the steaming pots and pans, listening to him explain their functions and the stories behind them.

 

Sometimes, they meet up with grandpa’s friend Dum Dum Dugan for a game of bingo a few blocks over. Antoine would be given free reign over the men’s bingo boards, circling the called up numbers carefully, while his grandpa and Dum Dum gossiped like little old ladies. He got the feeling that the bingo was just an excuse to get together and catch up.

 

At least once every week, usually on the weekends, Antoine and his grandpa would take the bus to the other side of the city. His grandpa would pack them lunch and the two of them would walk to the bus stop with matching Captain America backpacks, though his grandpa’s was a lot bigger and it only had one shield on it.

 

The bus ride was long, but they amused themselves with playing I, Spy and pointing out famous New York landmarks. The passed through Harlem and grandpa pointed out the corners where he played with his friends and lament over the stores that had shut down, only to be replaced by new ones. They got off in Brooklyn, stopping at a florist just down the road from the bus stop. His grandpa bought a bouquet of lilies that he handed to Antoine, who handled them with utmost care as to not damage the soft petals. Grandpa also got almost two dozen red carnations that he tucked under his arm and then they’d walk together through the gates of Greenwood cemetery.

 

His grandpa led them unerringly through rows of seemingly identical graves, engraved with names that Antoine had never heard off. He reached out to take his grandpa’s calloused hand, spooked by the silence and the rows of gravestones rising up to the blue sky like jagged teeth. His grandpa grew quiet, so unlike his usual boisterous self, but his grip was tight and his steps sure, and soon enough they came to a grave Antoine recognized.

 

 _‘Maeve Jones’_ it read ‘ _born 15 th May 1930, died 6th June 1982, aged 52; Loving wife, mother and grandmother. May she rest in peace.’_

 

His grandpa pulled out the wilting flowers from the vase, letting Antoine arrange the new lilies as he pleased, before they settled in front of the grave, Antoine listening avidly as his grandpa told stories about his grandmother. How he’d spotted her in a park, sitting with her friends and she’d caught his gaze and smiled. How it seemed to him that for the first time since the war had ended, the sun shined brightly enough to warm him. How pretty she had looked in her home-sewn wedding dress and how radiant holding their first child. How suddenly she’d grown frail one winter, touching the lump under her breast fearfully. How she’d smiled at him one last time on a warm summer day just like this one, and told him she loved him and ‘would he be a darling and open the blinds so she could see the sun shine?’

 

When the story came to its end, his grandpa’s eyes were bright and his voice faltered. In the absence of words, Antoine leaned his head on his chest, trying to imagine the face of someone he never got to know.

 

After that, they dusted themselves off and, bidding one last goodbye to the gravestone, continued on their way.

 

They came to the main road and continued deeper into the cemetery. There were more people here, somber women with equally quiet children and men in full parade uniform, eyes shining like their medals, dabbing their eyes with the edges of their sleeves. They passed through the military cemetery, walking up to the memorial rising above them all. Antoine scanned the myriad of names, until he found a familiar one and he tugged on his grandpa’s sleeve to point it out. ‘Jim Morita’ was written down in gold edged letters and his grandpa put a carnation down among the other flowers. And so it went, until his grandpa was left holding only two carnations out of the dozen he’d had before. "There were more", he explained to Antoine as they passed between the white graves, "but they were buried elsewhere or never buried anywhere at all. It’d take much more than a dozen carnations to honor them all."

 

They followed the road still, until they turned a corner and Antoine spotted a familiar shield, rendered in dark granite. There were several people here, some children like Antoine, breathlessly excited and tourists with clumsy cameras, trying to capture the inscription on the stone.

 

His grandpa shook his head as he walked past them, guiding Antoine to the stoop where he laid down one of the carnations. Antoine tried to imagine the strength it would take someone to raise the granite shield off its perch. He came to the conclusion that Uncle Steve could probably have done it easily, if he didn't already have the one made out of vibratium.

 

A young man in military uniform stopped them as they were leaving the grave.

 

“Excuse me,” he said “aren't you Gabe Jones? I did a report on you in high school. Sir, you were the reason I wanted to become a soldier.”

 

His grandpa took the proffered hand, patting him on the arm. Antoine watched the man, his skin as dark as their own, but lightened where the burn scars were visible on his hands.

 

“Thank you for your service.” His grandpa said and the man beamed.

 

“Thank you for yours.” he said “Such an honor to meet you.”

 

They said goodbye to the man, ducking into an alley behind the memorial. There were no people here, just tall grey walls framing the sky above them.

 

“There’s something I want you to remember, Antoine.” His grandpa said and his voice seemed to echo off the concrete walls. “Heroes aren't always written on memorial walls or given statues for their bravery. Sometimes, they walk among us, unseen and unrecognized, with only a small sign to show for their work.”

 

“Like a scar?” asked Antoine.

 

“Yes. Just like that.”

 

Soon enough, they came to a very small gravestone. It was simple in design, but obviously cared for. There was a pair of carnations already resting on the grass in front of it and a squished up bowler hat peeking from behind the stone. His grandpa grinned when he saw it.

 

“Dugan.” he muttered “He probably forgot it here one day. I bet he’s still looking for the damn thing.” But he left it where it lay.

 

Antoine had to squint to see the letters. They aren't edged in gold, and the bright sunlight reflecting off the white stone is giving him a headache.

 

“James ‘Bucky’ Barnes” he read out loud “Too loved to ever be forgotten.”

 

His grandpa smiled, brushing his fingers through Antoine’s hair.

 

“We wrote what we thought your Uncle Steve would have wanted. Though, knowing them, it would have been something like ‘You took all the stupid with you, jerk’.” his grandpa shrugged “It was just how they were. Best men I ever knew.”

 

They left the graves behind, settling in a park adjacent to the cemetery to eat their sandwiches. Antoine was surprised to realize it was barely noon, as the trip felt a lot longer than that. Both he and grandpa were subdued, chewing their sandwiches in silence.

 

On the way back, grandpa was back to his boisterous self, telling jokes and tickling Antoine, until he was laughing loudly enough to govern disapproving glances from the other commuters. They didn't talk about their day at dinner at all, watching the evening cartoons instead.

 

The next evening was very warm and they stayed outside to catch fireflies.

 

They had a little net, held together more by pure luck than actual craftsmanship, and they ran around the garden, chasing the bright yellow dots.

 

Finally, his grandpa caught one in the net and cupped it carefully with his big calloused palms, handing it to Antoine’s much smaller ones.

 

Antoine watched the bright little light dancing in his hands, the insect’s wings tickling him, and it seemed to him like his grandpa had plucked a star right out of the sky for Antoine to hold and marvel at.

 

“You know,” his grandpa suddenly spoke “some people believe that fireflies are the altered souls of soldiers who died in battle.”

 

Antoine looked at the fluttering bug in his palms, before spreading his fingers and watching as the firefly rejoined the others, zipping around the garden and leaving trails of light in their paths.

 

His grandpa was watching the fireflies, but he looked like his thoughts were somewhere else. On the very edge of the garden, two fireflies were dancing around each other. In the dim light, Antoine could almost imagine that one of them was carrying a shield.

 

**

 

Antoine grew up on stories from the war told like fairytales before bed.

 

Instead of the poor pauper boy leaping through obstacles with magical items, there was Steve Rogers, weak but defiant, emerging from a metal cage made with science as a symbol, but staying good and kind and just, in the face of his adversaries.

 

Instead of Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, there was Bucky Barnes with his sniper rifle, keeping his loved ones safe from his lonely vantage point.

 

Instead of princesses trapped in towers, there was Peggy Carter, fists flying and a better shot than any prince, who refused to be kept in towers and faced the dragons on her own.

 

And above them all, was his grandpa, Gabe Jones, who spoke a hundred languages and understood a hundred more, the man no code was safe from and who sent the Nazis running in fear, wielding a weapon stolen from the most guarded of HYDRA prisons.

 

Antoine grew up knowing that heroes didn't have to be princes or paupers from distant lands, but that they could be people just like him, his own blood.

 

Antoine didn't need a tattoo to show he was the grandson of a Howling Commando; it was written into his very soul.

 

**

 

His grandpa cleaned his house top to bottom about once every year, right before Aunt Peggy was due for a visit. Antoine helped him air the cupboards and catch the moths that flew out of the darkest edges of the kitchen. They picked up all the carpets and carried them out, and the neighbors came to their windows to investigate the excited whooping as they egged each other on while beating the carpets with an old stick. All the bedding was washed and hung in the garden, where Antoine liked to run through it when the wind picked up, imagining he was flying through a cloud, while his grandpa laughed when he invariably hit the post and tangled himself up in sheets. They cleaned the old wooden floors, on their knees with matching brushes, butts sticking up in the air as they scrubbed.

 

When they finished, the house was gleaming and smelled more of laundry detergent than the smoke from grandpa’s cigarettes.

 

On the morning when Aunt Peggy was supposed to arrive, Antoine was stationed at the window upstairs with one of his grandpa’s old communicators, keeping a sharp look out for a red Buick National. When he saw it rounding the corner, he screamed so loudly his grandpa would have probably heard him without the communicator.

 

Antoine ran down the stairs and through the front door, straight into Aunt Peggy’s waiting arms. She laughed freely and smelled of wildflowers, covering his face with kisses that left red lipstick traces.

 

“It’s good to see you too, kiddo.” she murmured right before he released her, embarrassed by his excitement. Aunt Peggy never seemed to age, looking slim and strong in her pencil skirt and jacket, her red hair blowing in the breeze.

 

His grandpa stood on the front porch and saluted her, which she returned, the heels of her shined shoes clicking. She then swept him in a tight hug and Antoine swore he could hear grandpa’s ribs creaking.

 

They helped her with her bags, trying and failing to look unaffected under the weight of them.

 

“Are you carrying an armory with you?” his grandpa muttered, but Aunt Peggy just laughed at them, holding the doors open. They settled her in the guest room and Antoine beamed with pride when she noticed the flowers he’d picked and arranged in the vase by the bed.

 

They sat down at the table and grandpa served them lunch, stammering when Aunt Peggy complimented his cooking. Then, they moved to the back porch, drinking lemonade and catching up. Antoine watched Aunt Peggy as she spoke, enthralled by the way she gestured with her hands, her red painted nails emphasizing her words. She spoke about her niece Sharon, only a few years older than Antoine and he wondered if she had red hair too.

 

Eventually, he grew drowsy in the afternoon heat, laid his head on Aunt Peggy’s knee and fell asleep.

 

He woke up a few hours later, when the sky had grown dark and the air cold, and the voices of Aunt Peggy and his grandpa had grown quieter.

 

His grandpa guided him to the bedroom and he curled up under a quilt his grandmother made, on the unused side of the bed, inhaling the smell of spices that lingered on it. His grandpa and Aunt Peggy were still talking downstairs and he wondered what they were talking about for their voices to sound so sad.

 

Aunt Peggy taught him to fight in his grandpa’s backyard. She showed him how to curl his fist to throw a punch and kick so he had the highest amount of leverage. And she taught him how to fall, which he did a lot. By the end of the hour, Antoine was sweaty and dirty, and Peggy didn't have a hair out of place.

 

His grandpa watched them with a strange expression on his face and smoked his cigarette in silence, until he called them up for lemonade and cookies.

 

“I’m surprised you haven’t taught him how to fight yet.” Aunt Peggy said, tucking an unruly curl behind her ear. In the light, Antoine could see the silver threaded through it. “He’s a natural.”

 

“I put a lot more stock in talking these days.” His grandpa replied, lighting another cigarette. “I was hoping he wouldn't need it.”

 

Peggy was silent for a long while, sipping her lemonade and looking out into the garden.

 

“You’re right. But I still feel better knowing the kid can throw a punch when he needs to.”

 

Aunt Peggy left after a few days filled with laughter and stories, driving away in her red painted car. Right before she left, she hugged them both and pressed kisses to their cheeks, and as he drove away, they waved goodbye, smiling like loons, with twin imprints of red lips on their cheeks.

 

*

 

Soon after, Antoine borrowed some of his grandpa’s best stationary and wrote a letter to Sharon Carter.

 

He asked his grandpa to look it over and rolled his eyes when he burst out laughing while reading it.

 

All he wanted to know was if she had red hair too.

 

**

 

Grandpa had a picture on the mantelpiece where he was shaking hands with Martin Luther King Jr. and both of them had huge smiles on their faces.

 

His grandpa would point to the picture and say: “My hero.”

 

Next to it was a newspaper clipping of his grandpa holding Rosa Parks in a tight embrace.

 

His grandpa would point to it and say: “My hero.”

 

Antoine was pretty sure that his grandpa was still harboring a crush on Maya Angelou.

 

“Phenomenal woman.” he’d call her, “Talent and beauty. A true black woman.”

 

Sometimes, when they danced, his grandpa spoke of a woman named Josephine Baker. “She moved like a dream.” he’d say, letting Antoine lead him into a sober waltz.

 

On the bookshelf, there was a collection of Langston Hughes’s poems that his grandpa had edited and sponsored. It sold in thousands of copies.

 

Every year, his grandpa would meet up with Dum Dum Dugan at the New York City Pride parade, holding up a sign that said: _‘In WW2 we fought for everyone to be free.’_ and _‘The Howling Commandoes fought for all kinds of love.’_ Dum Dum’s daughter would walk with them, holding hands with her girlfriend. Dum Dum pointed them out proudly and called them ‘his daughters’.

 

One time, a particularly obnoxious reporter had cornered his grandpa and asked him ‘if Captain America approved of homosexual relations among his men, and if there was truth to the rumor that he was in a relationship with Bucky Barnes.’ Grandpa Gabe turned around, grabbed Dum Dum by his coat flaps and planed a big wet kiss right on his lips. Antoine’s mother laughed for hours at the dumbfounded look on Dum Dum’s face.

 

On a separate occasion, grandpa answered a question on ‘where a woman’s place was’, with “Wherever the fuck she wants, you sexist creep.” and then became a frequent guest at feminist rallies, sitting politely in the front row and listening. He was offered a speaking role at these functions, but always refused, saying that there were others that knew more about the issues raised. “I’m just here to educate myself and be better to the women in my life.” he’d say.

 

Antoine grew up knowing about these people that had influenced his grandpa and been influenced by him, and had in turn changed an entire generation for the better.

 

So when a schoolyard bully threw a slur in his face as smoothly as one might shoot a bullet, Antoine had no qualms about sitting him down and explaining the tortured history of his people and the role the boy’s ancestors played in it. The bully grew chalk white, threatened violence with his fists, but Antoine never stopped talking, even when he took him down with a well placed Carter punch.

 

**

 

His grandpa fluently spoke eight languages and understood a further five, which meant that Antoine had to learn the basics of them very early, as his grandpa liked to slip into Italian when he was cooking, and Portuguese when they were washing dishes. He spoke Mandarin with the Chinese ambassador and Serbian with a tiny girl that sold flowers on the corner. He sang in Spanish and in French and wrote poems in Japanese. And he swore in a multitude of different languages, words blurring together in his fury.

 

By the time he was ten, Antoine knew how to say “Dicksucking fuckwit’ in 11 different languages and gleefully recited them every morning at breakfast, no matter what his mother did or said.

 

His grandpa always insisted on looking over his English homework, asking him to explain his essays in detail and sometimes encouraging him to rework them entirely. They read the assigned reading together, discussing it after. Some they both liked and some they both hated, but they learned soon enough that most of it they understood very differently.

 

Antoine always had an A in English class, thought his teachers never liked him much. They said he asked too many questions. It made his grandpa fume and threaten to crash the parent-teacher conferences.

 

“You need to remember, Antoine,” his grandpa would say “you’re a Jones too. And we’re people of words. Never use a fist when you can use your words and don’t lie if you can. Lies are words that sour grow in your mouth, until one day you find that you’re spewing acid and have dissolved everything you love.”

 

It was ironic that later on, Antoine chose a path paved with secrets. Despite that, he always told the truth when he could and used words to weave traps tighter than any fist.

 

**

 

When he was in high school, Antoine had a girlfriend. Her name was Shan Lin and she was beautiful. Her hair was as dark as a raven’s wing, her figure trim and tall, and when he tried to tell her that in Mandarin, she told him that he had the accent of a Bangkok hooker and walked away.

 

He was left standing dejectedly in the hallway, promising himself that his grandpa would be answering some very uncomfortable questions very soon, when she came back and offered him lessons.

 

“Only until you improve your accent.” she said.

 

That turned into a month, then six and then their excuse of ‘Mandarin lessons’ was fooling no one.

 

Antoine brought her home to meet Grandpa Gabe one afternoon. He introduced them and grandpa greeted her in Mandarin, at which point she also accused him of having the accent of a Bangkok hooker. They spent the rest of the afternoon conversing in rapid fire Mandarin that Antoine could barely follow. By the way the two of them kept laughing at his questions he had a sneaking suspicion that grandpa was telling embarrassing stories.

 

“I like you.” Grandpa said to her when they were saying goodbye. “Take good care of my boy.”

 

She solemnly promised to do so in Mandarin, with the perfectly executed accent of a Bangkok hooker.

 

They split up when they went to college, both of them rational enough to know that a long distance relationship would only be a strain. They stayed friends, though. She became a CEO of a high income company and sometimes slipped Antoine tips about white collar criminals.

 

Some years later, his SHIELD cell broke up a prostitution and slavery ring in Bangkok. Antoine was in charge of a room full of young women staring at him with fearful eyes and flinching at any contact.

 

In under an hour, they were all sitting with cups of tea and chatting with him in that familiar accent, their burden lifted if only just for a moment.

 

He thought about Shan Lin, about his Aunt Peggy and his mother, harried but smiling, and saw echoes of them in these women that spoke with his grandpa’s words.

 

*

 

Antoine was a Junior SHIELD agent, just moved to DC, when he got the call that his grandpa was dying.

 

“Grandpa is really sick,” his mother had sobbed into the receiver “he probably won’t last the night. Please, can get here as soon as you can?”

 

In the silence after the dial tone, he could feel his life breaking in a million pieces.

 

He had no friends in DC, just acquaintances. But he did have Sharon’s phone number, sent over in one of her emails, ‘if you ever need anything’. They were supposed to be making plans for a first meeting, not this.

 

So, he called her and he doesn't remember what he said, but she was at his door in half an hour. Her hair was blonde, but her tight hug was familiar enough that he’d had to choke back a sob into her shoulder.

 

“Thank you.” was all he managed to say as she was ushering him into her car.

 

“Uncle Gabe was the only reason I passed my Spanish exam. Don’t mention it.” she’d said. She smelled like wildflowers and Antoine felt his eyes well up.

 

Sharon drove him to New York that night, going as fast as she dared in her red Toyota. Antoine watched the lights pass by through his window and thought of fireflies. His phone was clutched in his hands, as if he was trying to will it not to ring.

 

He didn't remember if he talked on the trip at all, but he did remember praying, over and over; “Please, let me say goodbye. Please, at least let me say goodbye.”

 

They’d barely stopped in that familiar driveway when he was already out of the car and running. All the windows were lit up and the house was full of people.

 

His father captured him in a hug when he flew through the doors. He smelled like cigarette smoke, but he and grandpa never smoked the same brand.

 

“You came just in time.” His father said, taking him by the arm firmly to guide him up the stairs.

 

His mother was sitting in a chair at the side of the bed, one of grandpa’s hands cupped in hers. She looked up when Antoine came in and he could see a single tear make its way down her cheek.

 

His grandpa was lying on the bed, covered with his favorite quilt. He looked smaller somehow, as if his ever present strength had been stripped from him. His breathing was labored, but present. Antoine fell into the chair on the other side of the bed, taking his grandpa’s other hand to press the cooled palm against his cheek.

 

His grandpa’s eyes opened slowly. They were foggy and dark in the candlelight, but he managed a small smile when he caught sight of Antoine.

 

“Good morning, kiddo.” The hand in his gripped back, just a little.

 

“Silly grandpa,” Antoine managed to choke out “it isn't morning anymore.”

 

His grandpa’s eyes shut and he fell back into unconsciousness, a familiar smile playing across his lips.

 

Antoine pressed a kiss to his grandpa’s palm. He could barely see his mother across the bed, his eyesight blurry from tears. But so they stayed, Antoine and his mother, keeping vigil over every indrawn breath, minds filled with a thousand precious memories and choking on the words left unsaid.

 

Right as the first fingers of dawn painted across the horizon, changing the sky into hues of pinks and blues, grandpa Gabe woke up, his eyes bright as he watched the window.

 

“Open the curtains.” He whispered. “I want to see the dawn.”

 

Antoine’s mother threw open the curtains, letting the muted light spread through the room and his grandpa grinned, brightly, almost boyishly. His eyes fell shut and one last deep breath left his lungs.

 

Then nothing.

 

*

 

The funeral was held at a familiar cemetery, his grandpa’s name already engraved next to his grandmother’s. Soon enough Antoine lost all ability to distinguish between the faces of the people coming in to pay their respects. There were many of them, all in dark clothes, and all with tears in their eyes. He felt empty and worn, replying to the condolences mechanically.

 

Then, a curious hush came from the crowd and they were moving aside to let someone pass. It was his Aunt Peggy making her way slowly down the aisle, walking stick in one hand and Sharon supporting her on the other. She walked up to grandpa’s picture and Sharon carefully let go of her arm, stepping away.

 

Aunt Peggy stood there for a long time, before she leaned forward to press the pads of her fingers to the picture and then bowed as deeply as her aged frame allowed.

 

Antoine thought he had no more tears left to shed. He was wrong.

 

Peggy’s face was wrinkled and her hair was snow white, but her lips were painted with red lipstick and her arms had lost none of their strength when she pulled Antoine into a hug. It was so familiar, so comforting; it almost felt like he could open his eyes and wake up on their front porch, and his grandpa would take him to bed, smelling of spices and cigarette smoke.

 

Antoine hid his face into his Aunt’s shoulder and cried.

 

*

 

Antoine threw himself into his work afterward, always smiling and always kind, but never letting himself get to close to his assigned team.

 

He inherited the house from his grandpa, but let it fall to disrepair. He claimed it was because he was always on missions somewhere, but truthfully, the familiar sight of it twisted a knife in his gut that would never leave.

 

So he avoided it. For a long time.

 

Then SHIELD fell and the legacy of his Aunt Peggy fell with it. They had to rebuild it, piece by agonizing piece, into a stronger and better organization.

 

But they succeeded.

 

“Two weeks, Trip.” Coulson had said, clapping him on the shoulder. “Do with them what you will, but I don’t want to see you around the Playground, is that clear?”

 

“Yes Sir.” Antoine grinned, exchanging a look with Melinda, standing in the background. She nodded, so he turned around and left, popping through the lab to say goodbye.

 

He lasted two days in his cramped apartment, before packing a bag and driving to a familiar house.

 

The meticulously tended front garden was overrun with weeds and Antoine almost turned around right there. But then, he noticed that the yellow rose his grandpa liked was overflowing with sweet smelling blooms and that the apple tree was full of small green apples. The garden was still beautiful, if a little too wild, but that was okay. He knew a few people like that.

 

The front porch was in need of repair and a good coat of paint, but the door opened smoothly when he turned they key in the lock. The insides were dusty enough that his feet left traces where he stepped and the sunlight shining through the dirty windows reflected of the dust mites in the air. A moth flew from the kitchen cupboard and he chased it almost instinctively. 

 

Antoine pulled down the white cloth from the table and set down the chairs. The old gramophone in the corner looked like it might still work, given some incentive.  He could almost imagine Coulson fiddling with a communicator on the kitchen table and Skye in the kitchen singing along to the radio. There was several poem books on the shelves that he knew were Simmons’s favorites and he smiled, thinking about Melinda brushing against him in the hallway, whispering a joke in Mandarin. He thought Fitz might enjoy chasing fireflies.

 

Antoine took a rag from under the kitchen sink and started cleaning.

 

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Dedicated to my grandpa, who spoke 8 languages and used to tell me stories.
> 
>  
> 
> Find me on [tumblr](http://jjjat3am.tumblr.com/)
> 
> More on Sharon and Antoine [here](http://jjjat3am.tumblr.com/post/93451785956/jjjat3am-no-but-antoine-triplett-and-sharon)


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